The difference between panhandling and selling a street-community newspaper is a sense of pride, says Shirley Davidson.
She knows from first-hand experience.
“When you panhandle, people look down on you. When you sell a newspaper, they look up to you. They talk to you,” said Davidson, who has sold Victoria Street Newz outside Thrifty Foods in James Bay for nearly seven years.
After a decade, the city’s street newspaper ceased publication last month. It has passed the torch to Megaphone, an established street newspaper in Vancouver keen to expand to the Island.
“It’s a great opportunity to be in Victoria. People are very attuned and concerned about issues relating to homelessness and poverty,” said Sean Condon, executive director of Megaphone, which operates as a non-profit organization.
Condon was in Victoria Friday to launch the first local issue of Megaphone and meet with about a dozen vendors, most of whom worked for Street Newz.
“There’s a lot of excitement here,” Condon said at the Disability Resource Centre on Fort Street, the local hub for the publication.
Like Street Newz, Megaphone serves two purposes — to give a voice to the city’s homeless and poor, and to give them an opportunity to earn extra income.
Each vendor pays 75 cents for an issue of the newspaper and sells it for the cover price of $2. The profit is theirs to keep.
“I was able to help myself out of a bit of a financial bind. And now it’s nice to have a little extra change in my pocket,” said Evelyn Baron, who sells newspapers five days a week, four hours a day in Cook Street Village. She greets passersby with compliments about new hairdos or fashionable outfits, and has treats on hand for good dogs.
“I feel part of a community. When I’m not there for a few days, people ask if I’m OK.”
Megaphone is published biweekly, in colour and in a magazine-size format. The content is written by freelance journalists and the vendors themselves, who share their own stories and thoughts on poverty issues.
Megaphone features a mix of Vancouver and Victoria stories, which Condon said brings a deeper understanding to issues affecting the area. The first issue profiles vendors and looks at how the pending closing of the Victoria Youth Custody Centre might affect youth who are already at risk of homelessness, crime and poverty.
In Vancouver, the newspaper recently broke a story about an underground safe-injection site and offered journalism workshops to vendors.
It is funded through vendors, grants from Vancity, the City of Vancouver and reader donations. Condon hopes Victoria will also come on board.
“It’s great to see the city’s street newspaper didn’t die but is taking a new form,” said city councillor Lisa Helps, who dropped by the launch.
She said she will try to help Megaphone increase its busker licences, which the vendors need to sell on downtown sidewalks.
“Not only does something like this give an economic benefit but it helps people feel part of something,” she said.
Janine Bandcroft, the longtime editor of Street Newz, had mixed feelings about letting the paper go, but said, “Megaphone is very professional and part of the global street-news family. They will do great things.”
Bandcroft thanked all the people who helped with Street Newz over the years and noted its full catalogue is in the University of Victoria library archives.
